Welcome back from vacation everyone. I hope y'all are tanned, well-rested and ready to go.

And now for the weekly notes:
(1) Welcome Webelos
(2) Tonight's Meeting
(3) Mansfield Campout
(4) Merit Badge Monday Update
(5) Mt. Norris March Campout
(6) Summer Camp
(7) Next Week's PLC
(8) Notable Accomplishments

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Welcome Webelos
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Tonight's the night we welcome the boys who were Webelos until just a couple of short weeks ago. We must welcome them into the fold and assimilate them as we have assimilated all others who have come before them! In order to make this go as smoothly as possible, please give them every reason to *want* to be with troop 635 by looking sharp at the meetings and treating them with all of the respect and deference that you do me. Or maybe more. Actually, yeah. A *lot* more. That would be a good idea.

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Tonight's Meeting
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Lots going on tonight, not the least of which is the cross-in. We also have an election for the Order of the Arrow and planning for the Mount Mansfield campout this weekend. Since we have lots to do, please make sure you're at the meeting on time.

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Mansfield Campout
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Speaking of the Mansfield campout, I've attached a permission slip for those of you who would like to go. There is going to be a hike up to the summit, along the ridge of the mountain (roughly following the Long Trail) and then coming back down to the campsite. In order to qualify for this hike, you need to be at least first class with hiking experience and the permission of el Scoutmaster (don't you wish you'd shown me a little more deference *now*? Thought so.)

If there are people who are interested in coming up for a day hike, we may be able to accommodate that as well. If we can find a couple of willing adults to commit to coming up for the day with the uber-hike group and supervising the day hikers, anyone and his brother can come for the day.

Finally, if the day hikers would like to stay the night on the mountain, that's completely cool. Since the uber-hike adults will be back in the main group, the day hike adults wouldn't even have to commit to being around overnight.

If you have any questions, let me know at this evening's meeting.

Mansfield Hike 2007 Permission slip

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Merit Badge Monday Update
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MBM has been fairly successful but we're going to have one more week of Citizenship in the World. Yes, this is more than we had planned but what do you want me to do? Just *not* finish the badge work? Those of you in this group, look to another email either tonight or tomorrow with details about next Monday's meeting, what I'm hoping to accomplish and how I'm hoping to accomplish it.

Next up and starting on Monday, March 19th will be Citizenship in the Nation. That's also going to be a four-week badge. There are some details that I'm still nailing down but I'll have a full syllabus out for everyone no later than next week's weekly update. FYI, this is another academic-style badge so boys who sign up should understand it involves a lot of sitting, talking, and NOT LOOKING AT MY BLOODY BINARY CLOCK EVERY THREE SECONDS AND MAKING OOHING AND AAHING SOUNDS WHEN THE LEDs MAKE SYMMETRICAL PATTERNS! <Ahem>. Oops. Sorry about that. Little tirade now and then does the body good. Or so my drill sergeant always tells me.

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Mt. Norris March Campout
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If you are a scout who is not yet first class, pay attention to this. CLOSE attention.

We are having a campout on the weekend of March 30 - April 1 at Mt. Norris. We are gearing the entire weekend to helping you advance. If you are not there and it's not for a fantastic reason, then I shall taunt you once and then I shall taunt you a second time. With a sneering French accent. And even, perhaps, whilst donning a beret.

If you are *not* under first class but you are in at least eighth grade or are an Assistant Troop Guide, we'd like to talk to you about how you can be involved to help us develop the program for the weekend. We're going to have Scott Kelley and Mike Kling working as Assistant Scoutmasters that weekend, along with at least Mr. Pelchat, Mr. Macy and myself. We'd like to have a killer program and the more help we have to do this, the better. If you're interested, let me or Chris Fleury know ASAP.

Mt. Norris Winter Campout 2007 Permission slip

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Summer Camp
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Speaking of rip-snorting good times that (a) will be led by Assistant Scoutmasters Kelley and Kling and (b) you will most *definitely* not want to miss, I wanted to remind people that we are accepting summer camp sign ups now. Some deadlines for early bird fees are approaching, so if you're interested in going, please get the attached summer camp form to Mrs. Fleury as soon as you can. If you can't go and your name isn't Leo Gauthier or Brian Thompson (who both have very good excuses for why they can't), you'd better either transfer troops or expect a LOT of harassing comments from your Fearless Leader trying to convince you to do what's really best for you anyway.

Grab the information and form

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Next Week's PLC
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As you'd expect, there was no PLC this week because not everyone had school. That means we'll have our normal monthly PLC next Tuesday night at my house from 6:30 - 8:00.

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Notable Accomplishments
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Some great stuff happened over the break that I thought I'd let you know about:

(1) Ross and Scott Kelley were both part of the Essex indoor track team that BLEW the competition out of the water at states. The senior class alone scored enough points to beat each of the other combined team scores and both Ross and Scott contributed significantly to the great win.

(2) In varsity wrestling, Tom Cogley beat the #2 seed in the state quarterfinals only to fall one point short in the semis. Congrats to Tom on taking 6th overall.

(3) In JV wrestling, we have a state champion on our hands! Our very own Seamus Page established himself as the man to beat in the competition just a couple of weekends ago. And then *last* weekend, Seamus went on to represent Vermont rather well by taking 2nd place in all of New England.

Congratulations to all of these boys for their outstanding athletic achievements.

That's it for now, folks. See you tonight.

Your Scoutmaster,

Sonnick